The EAEA / NVL Conference 2010 on EQF and NQFs

25.-26.11.2010, Brussels

130 participants from 35 countries responded to the EAEA and NVL invitation to discuss the important issues of EQF and NQFs with the colleagues from all over Europe!

The theme of the conference is relevant for the different sectors of adult learning and the participants could really benefit from the cross-sectorial discussions. The main goal of the conference was to discuss the NQFs especially in relation to non-formal learning and to look for ways of developing the civic society approach to have in-formal and non-formal learning included in the EQF.

The conference provided highly competent expert presentations as well as possibilities for the participants to work in group sessions, to post and clarify questions important for them.

Key-notes speeches

Jens Bjornavold - The qualifications frameworks can facilitate validation. “The frameworks use learning outcome as a reference instead of educational input. That creates a common language between sectors, and it is a condition for validation.”

Michael Feutrie - To create continuity in discontinuity, that is the role of validation in lifelong learning according to Michel Feutrie. But in spite of support from EU-policy there is no shared definition or vision of validation, rather resistance from some important stakeholders, he said.

Michael Teutsch - “Qualifications frameworks are more than stratification,” said Michael Teutsch of the European Commission. “For many countries in Europe it is also an opportunity to develop validation of non-formal learning,” he added.

Interviews

Nada Stoimenova - Working with qualificationss framework will be improved through cooperation, both between educational sectors and between countries in the region. That is one the lessons of the conference for Nada Stoimenova.

Lennart Fast - ”I am afraid that it will be difficult to defend the free zone of non-formal adult education inside a system of qualifications frameworks, but the folk high schools cannot neglect it. We have to be pragmatic,”